Tories heading for ‘warfare’, Farage predicts, as ex-Cabinet minister pleads with voters to ‘unite the right’

Published

9 months ago

June 16, 2024

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Nigel Farage has predicted the Tories will soon descend into “warfare” as a former Conservative minister warned voters about a “Labour elective dictatorship” if they voted for Reform.

The Reform UK leader told The Sunday Telegraph that divisions in the party were only going to “get worse” in the run-up to polling day on 4 July.

Mr Farage was speaking as three polls this week painted a bleak picture for Mr Sunak – and a sunny one for his party.

A poll by Savanta for The Sunday Telegraph showed the Tories down four points to just 21% of the vote – the lowest by that pollster since the dying days of Theresa May’s premiership in early 2019.

In a boost for Mr Farage, the poll showed Reform UK up three points with 13% of the vote.

Election latest: Tories ‘facing electoral extinction’, says pollster

A separate Survation poll for Best for Britain, published by The Sunday Times, predicted the Tories would win just 72 seats in the next parliament, compared with 456 for Labour.

The result would give Labour a majority of 262 seats – far surpassing the landslide Labour achieved by Tony Blair in 1997 – while the Liberal Democrats would pick up 56 seats, Reform seven and the Greens one seat.

Earlier in the week, a YouGov poll put Reform ahead of the Tories for the first time – on 19% of the vote, compared with 18% for the Conservatives.

Mr Farage, who is set to launch Reform’s manifesto on Monday, told the Sunday Telegraph that “within a week, you watch… there’ll be warfare within the Conservative Party as there was in the run-up to ’97,” referring to the election when Labour last won a landslide under Mr Blair.

He likened the current divisions in the Conservative Party – chiefly over migration – to splits under former Tory prime minister John Major over joining the Euro.

“In the run-up to ’97, John Major said that he was agnostic about joining the Euro,” he told the newspaper.

“Those who wanted to join the Euro did their own manifesto and raised their own money. It was an absolutely split, divided joke and the same will happen in this election. You watch, it’s coming.

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“You will start to see those MPs, who I agree with on most things, start becoming much more vociferous about their stance as opposed to that of the party. The splits are going to get worse. And to them, I will say: ‘Sorry guys, you are just in the wrong party’.”

It comes as former immigration minister Robert Jenrick, who is touted as a future Tory leader, gave an interview with the same newspaper saying he “shares the frustrations” of traditional Tory voters who are tempted to defect to Reform – but that they should stick with Mr Sunak’s party to avoiding handing Labour a landslide.

“I have immense sympathy for those natural Conservatives who feel let down and drawn to Reform,” he said.

“Not only do I understand their frustrations, I share many of them.

“The tax burden is too high, the criminal justice system too soft and public services too inefficient. My disagreements with the government on immigration policy meant I resigned from cabinet.”

He added: “But, ultimately, a vote for Reform will only give Labour a blank cheque to take our country back to the 1970s.

“Voting Reform cannot be the answer. It can only bring about a government that increases taxes and immigration. Their success can only weaken the conservative movement. The right cannot unify after the election if there is no meaningful force in parliament to coalesce around.

“Our task is to make conservatives across Britain aware of this peril. If we can do that, and make the case that only a vote for the Conservative Party can prevent a calamitous one-party state come 5 July, then we can avert disaster.”

Politics

People living near new pylons could get £250-a-year off their energy bills, minister says

Published

1 hour ago

March 10, 2025

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People living near new pylons could get £250-a-year off their energy bills, minister says

Residents who live near newly installed pylons will be compensated with £250-a-year off their energy bills, a minister has said.

Housing and planning minister Alex Norris told Sky’s Wilfred Frost on Breakfast that communities “need to share the benefits” of the government’s tilt towards clean energy.

“If you’re making that sacrifice of having some of the infrastructure in your community, you should get some of the money back,” he said.

“So we’re making that commitment – £250-a-year if you are near those pylons.

“We think that’s a fair balance between people who are making that commitment to the country… they should be rewarded for that.”

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Ministers are currently pushing through an overhaul of the planning system – long seen as a brake on housebuilding and vital infrastructure projects – to stimulate growth in the economy.

Overnight it was announced parts of the planning system could be stripped away as part of the government’s attempts to speed up house building.

In its election-winning manifesto, Labour promised to build 1.5 million new homes over the next five years to tackle the lack of affordable housing, with recent statistics showing that there are 123,000 households in temporary accommodation – including nearly 160,000 children.

Sir Keir Starmer has repeatedly vowed to put “builders not blockers first”, announcing at the beginning of the year “unarguable cases” that are legally challenged will only be able to be brought back to the courts once – rather than the current three times.

Councils have also been told to come up with “immediate, mandatory” housing targets to help the government achieve its target.

Under the reforms announced last night, consulting bodies such as Sport England, the Theatres Trust and the Garden History Society will no longer be required for those looking to build under the new plans being considered by ministers.

While consultees will not be completely removed from the process, it will no longer be mandatory for builders to receive the opinion of such bodies and their scope will be “narrowed to focus on heritage, safety and environmental protection”, according to the government.

It is hoped the slimming down of the process will reduce waiting times for projects.

Mr Norris said the interjections of official bodies in planning decisions was causing a “bottleneck” in granting applications.

“I think viewers might be surprised to hear that there are two dozen-plus organisations that have to be consulted on planning applications – that’s providing a bit of a bottleneck, often not getting back in time,” he said.

He said that while members of Sport England were “fine people”, there was a case where the body held up the development in Bradford next to a cricket pitch.

“The hold up is around a disagreement on the speed at which cricket balls are hit,” he explained.

“So Sport England are querying the modelling of the speed at which the balls will be hit, and that, as a result, has meant that the whole process is now multiple years down the line, and there’s no build out.”